This workgroup will build on the ongoing engagement among working group members since the 2017 APRU SCL conference, and will expand its scope of work to include research on the emergence of distinct peri-urban territories that help with urban containment while serving as urban-rural linkage. The research will examine how such territories supports fluid ecological, cultural and socio-economic flows critical to a region’s sustainability and livability, as well as the new (innovative) typologies for human occupation of these territories.

This working group will invite scholars from Asia Pacific Rim countries specifically the US, China, South-East Asia and Australia to discuss different approaches to urban containment, especially contrasting and comparing the effectiveness of territory-based vs. rigid policy-line based approaches in curbing sprawl. The group invites scholars from a range of backgrounds including Planning, Landscape Architecture, Urban Ecology and similar disciplines. The questions to be addressed will likely include:

What are the important conditions critical to peri-urban territories’ goals of controlling growth while supporting the flows?

What are the critical factors affecting the performance of rural-urban boundaries and their territories?

What contextual factors or conditions help explain which approach is more appropriate?

Can different approaches be transferrable across places and contexts? What is the role of ‘design’ both as a tool for communicating these boundaries and territories and proposing future scenarios for their conditions?